200 Nazi War Criminals Identified, Official Says

An official of the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies in Los Angeles says he has discovered more than 200 new Nazi war crime suspects by reviewing confidential World War II immigration files compiled by international relief agencies.

Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the center, predicted that the documents will yield many more suspected Nazi war criminals, including a large list of people living in the United States.

The documents, some held by the International Red Cross, had been kept secret to protect the privacy of refugees, Hier said last week.

Each immigration document gives the date and the name of the ship that transported each suspect, he said.

The files were obtained about three months ago, Hier said. Since then, he said, the Wiesenthal Center has notified governments of at least seven nations of suspected war criminals living within their boundaries. He said the files disclosed 17 suspected war criminals living in Britain, 50 in Australia, 44 in West Germany, 26 in Canada, 13 in Sweden, three in Venezuela and one, a Treblinka death camp guard, in Brazil.

Hier did not provide a complete breakdown of suspects in the 200 figure.

“In about two weeks we expect to produce a large list of those in the United States,” Hier said at a news conference.

Red Cross spokesman Gene Jeffers in Washington said he is seeking comment from the International Red Cross in Geneva.

West German Justice Ministry spokesman Juergen Schmid confirmed receipt of the list.

“We received it on Friday afternoon,” Schmid said, adding that Chancellor Helmut Kohl’s office also had received a copy.

“We are already checking it. After our check has been completed we will send the names to the appropriate prosecutors’ offices for further investigation,” Schmid told the Associated Press in a telephone interview.

He said the names on the list also will be furnished to the Nazi Documentation Center in Ludwigsburg for additional screening.

“It can be that some of the names on the list are already known here,” or that some already had come up in legal cases, Schmid said. He also said some may have moved to other countries, in which case Hier said the West Germans should disclose where these people moved.

None of the names will be made public in West Germany unless prosecutors determine that there is sufficient evidence to file charges, or unless suspects have been charged previously, Schmid said. Hier also said his staff will not disclose the names.

Hier said only about 5,000 people have been convicted of war crimes since 1945, but that more than 11 million people died as a result of such crimes during World War II.

“It is obvious from that calculation alone that tens of thousands of murderers escaped,” Hier said.